Meshwork User?

I'm starting this thread to keep up with other Meshwork artists that visit here. Please post only if you are working with Meshwork and would like to share info on your work.
I know there is a Meshwork newsgroup, but that lacks all the fun of iDevGames forums.

Our game engine uses meshwork models, so I have 319 models that I'd like to share, get tweeked, and show off some game making with. Doing it all myself is a less than inspiring.

I'll be posting some models, along with the a free version of the game editor as soon as I finish fixing this Antack v2 beta. (hint hint, I need reliable testers)

I actually avoid texturing permanently in Meshwork.
I'll set the facings without a texture, and then apply whatever texture I need in my game engine, on the fly.

This avoids large meshwork files.
Sometimes while testing a model its useful to texture it, but I clear the texture before actually using it.

I Mostly try to use Planar mapping, now that it actually works correctly in the current version of Meshwork.

To make a tiled texture in meshwork:
Select all the polygons you wish to texture, set them to the correct Planar mapping with a material. Hit ok. Now choose a smaller polygon, or area of polygons, then set the same Material to those polygons only. The texture will tile across the entire materialed surface.

The first time I found this out, it was in the beta and I was in awe...I had a GIANT quad with something like 1000 x1000 animating explosions, tiled across it. Very strange, but useful when necessary.

Anyhow, thanks to rantings of new member to iDevGames: DarkOcean's the helpful Jeff Quan whipped up the following tutorial to go along with his old one:

Photoshop image on a layer
select area to be masked out
delete
invert selection
Channels Pallette
New Channel>selection is white, mask is black
Modify with blur, curves or levels to get varying levels of transparency (black to grey) as desired.
Save for web.. as PNG-24 with Transparency

Quote:Originally posted by Jake Some are high poly, but there are tools that reduce the amount of polys right?

To some extent yes. The technique I use is this:
export to 3DS,
import into Cinema4D,
apply poly reduction,
export as 3DS,
drop onto my BINA file type applescript,
import into meshwork
re-map the textures
save as Meshwork file

If that fails to give quality results, its time to start from scratch or think of another way.

I'm thinking you have windows and stuff like which would make the polycount increase. If the structure is extremely basic and becomes distorted by polyreduction:

Enlarge your 3D preview to fullsscreen at the highest screen resolution you can get to.
Fill the screen with as much of the model as possible.
Snapshot (command shift 3)
Photoshop the snapshop into a correct texture material
New Meshwork model with only absolute needed details
Apply texture to each material face you need (3 for buildings, 2 sides in X, 2 Sides in Y, 2 Sides in Z..althought you can cheat if you won't be seeing some sides)

Ah, a year of using Meshwork and at last I feel like I know something about it.

lets assume this is your cylinder from the front view
___________
|__________|

Use Y planar mappion on this top part of the model:
____________

OR rotate the cylinder first 90∞ in X so it faces you in front view:
__________
/ \
| |
\_________/

Something like that...
From the top view select the front face (bottom of screen in that view) and use Z Planar mapping.

Warning!!! The 3D preview REQUIRES Textures with POWER of 2 (32x32, 64x64, 128x128, 256x256)
I tried this for thirty minutes, finally giving up on the stupid 3D preview, saved my models out as they were, brought them into the game engine and ....

one, the first one I did is TOO many poly's, I thought at first the skewed preview was a poly problem, so I copied, pasted, scaled, and connected the outer ring several times towards the center. Still the Preview SUCKS. Well the Too many poly one might be fun to pull from the center, after you connect overlaps (which still doesn't fix the preview)

Read the read me! its really easy, once you know how to use it . and then you can actually see your models working!!!

oh..the T3D EDIT application needs to be restarted to adjust to changes in your model after loadng it once, I cheat to avoid this, I just change the model name every time I modify it, usually I have scripts for textures so I don't have to change those names unless I change the the texture.

Ok have fun with the that, hope it helps with meshwork usage. We really need a better preview!! ugh.

Edit: fixed the link, sorry about that
EDIT2: FIXED THE TEXTURE BUG!! POWER OF 2 TEXTURES.

Quote:Originally posted by igame3d Warning!!! The 3D preview in Meshwork is STILL BROKEN.
I tried this for thirty minutes, finally giving up on the stupid 3D preview, saved my models out as they were, brought them into the game engine and ....

If you have Quesa installed in the right place, it should work. Download the newest Quesa, place it in /Library/CFMSupport and restart your computer.

Quote:Originally posted by Nickolei It seems like texturing in Meshwork (at least in 1.9) was buggy and rather unstraightforward. Anyone here have any luck with UVMapper?

POWER OF 2 TEXTURES, now we know.

U/V mapping takes some getting used to, and you can't modify your model after doing it, or you have to fix your U/V map all over again.

Duplicate your files, modify the duplicate for safe measure.

See post above, your are better off previewing your meshwork models in T3D.

Steps to U/V map for anyone who hasn't read the tutorial.
Assume you have a human (like the bob model in the T3D download)
If you haven't set faces yet, set the whole model to the third Material so you can see that you are making changes.

View from top
select the front face of the Model (facing down in top view)
set these poly's to the first material with Planar Z, hit OK
reset these poly's with the first material with Pinned mode.
SAVE AS ...before something goes wrong and you have to do this all over again.

Now Select the Back facing poly's (facing up in top view)
Set these poly's to the second material with Planar Z, hit OK
reset these poly's with the 2nd material with Pinned mode.
SAVE AS ...better safe than sorry

deselect all poly's

Command Click the first material to select all poly's with that material
Display menu, texture map.
Make the texture map window as big as possible or you could miss some clicks.
Click in the window to deselect poly's.
Click on points and adjust with the drag
CAREFULLY, click back into the modeling window (you don't want to accidentally move points!!)
and SAVE AS.

I find I can get away with just planar mapping mode this way, only having to go U/V for extreme poly's.